Virgin Atlantic shake-up: Edinburgh to Barbados dropped, daily Cape Town flights return

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• Aliks says:

  26 May26 May 07:05

  Last month we took advantage of reward flight availability Edinburgh to Barbados using our newly earned virgin upgrade vouchers to get a great deal on Upper Class flights for next January. This meant flying from London up to Edinburgh, but that isn’t such a hardship given the saving.

  Virgin cancelled a few days ago, rebooking us onto Manchester – Barbados, but a quick call (OK 70 minutes in queue at 7am) persuaded them to rebook us onto the LHR flights – great result!

  And we get into the fabled lounge at T3 although it won’t be such fun at 8am. . . .

  • Degsy says:

    26 May26 May 07:47

    It’ll be 12:00 somewhere, and it’d be rude not to make the most of it….

• Barry cutters says:

  26 May26 May 07:06

  Would be nice if they could actually release some reward seats on these (or any) route

  • SammyJ says:

    26 May26 May 08:21

    My thoughts exactly. Even with the ridiculously increased surcharges!

  • VSCXfan says:

    26 May26 May 11:29

    Managed to get 1 Reward seat in Upper LHR-IAD and IAD-LHR last week, but it took months of Seat Spy alerts and someone cancelling at the last minute to avoid returning via JFK-MAN (+ BA MAN-LHR).

    Both on-time flights and LHR & IAD lounges were as good as ever.

• Froggee says:

  26 May26 May 07:53

  Having been delighted to get the Barbados flights from Edinburgh, I’m totally gutted. My wife is of the view that adding on four hours each way from Edinburgh would turn it from a fun half-term trip to a big hassle and I’m inclined to agree. No way would we be travelling down in the morning which would mean another day of school missed. I’ll sit on it for a bit as I really fancied Barbados.

  You win some, you lose some.

• The real Swiss Tony says:

  26 May26 May 08:04

  Is it true there are no flights from Edinburgh to Manchester anymore? I’d have thought given that, instead they would be sending affected passengers via London?

• Froggee says:

  26 May26 May 08:37

  I can’t see any EDI-MAN flights. My guess is the issue with re-routing via London is they’d need to pay money to BA for the flights down to London and the bags would need to be interlined (I’m guessing this would add to the amount of money that BA would receive over and above buying a cheap ticket).

  And from our perspective, changing terminals at Heathrow is far from being a bundle of laughs. By the time you add on the time for the EDI-LHR flight and the connection there isn’t much in it. We’d be talking a 6:50am flight from Edinburgh and getting in an hour later than the MAN flight.

  With young kids, we’d do that if necessary e.g. flying to visit family but for a half term break it turns a really sociable leisure flight into an endurance test. I’m thinking it might be the Canaries instead. But Canaries = low cost carrier which is almost five hours of discomfort and means we’d be locked into the flights. The great thing about our Barbados arrangements is that the flights were cancellable for £30 each and the hotel was also refundable.

  I don’t blame Virgin for pulling the plug on the Edinburgh route as it clearly wasn’t commercial. It’s just sad. We had flights booked to Orlando with them for March 2020 from Edinburgh in Upper class with cash and they obviously didn’t happen either so I’m starting to think we’re doomed in terms of Virgin out of EDI.

  • Harry T says:

    26 May26 May 09:39

    Just get the train or plane down the night before?

    • The real Swiss Tony says:

      26 May26 May 09:44

      As noted there are no longer flights between Edinburgh and Manchester, and as Froggee says it’s a completely different proposition when you’re expected to do that with kids but thought you were on a nonstop flight from your local airport.

      Then you’ve got the grim prospect of the journey home with a comparatively short overnight flight being followed by the vagaries of UK rail transport on what I suspect will be a Sunday.

      • Froggee says:

        26 May26 May 11:43

        ^this (although we get in on a Monday).

• Sally B says:

  26 May26 May 10:13

  Virgin Atlantic have also announced that they are cancelling their Heathrow-Havana Winter service.

  “We’re disappointed to confirm that due to the unique complexities of Cuban operations, we have taken the difficult decision to withdraw our plans for London Heathrow – Havana services. Our services scheduled to commence from 30th October 2022, operating as a Winter-only service until 24 March 2023, will be cancelled.”

  • Rhys says:

    26 May26 May 10:17

    Weird. Still seems bookable online…

    • Jonathan says:

      26 May26 May 10:52

      The route can’t be booked online, even whenever they’re flying there !

    • Sally B says:

      26 May26 May 11:59

      Virgin’s email today mentions “Bookings affected by these changes were updated in your GDS on Saturday 28 May 2022.” The fares that are showing online are all fully flexible fares in anticipation of the cancellation apparently.

• Andrew says:

  26 May26 May 11:13

  Seriously disappointed with this turn of events. Again.
  My wife and I booked in 2021 for EDI-BGI late March 2022 and that was cancelled. We had separately booked accommodation on Barbados so had to drive from Glasgow to Manchester with the added expense of an overnight there and the annoyance of mad security queues. At least we had a decent holiday but 4 hours drive home instead of a 45 minute taxi took the shine off a bit.
  (I note that Virgin are reimbursing expenses for this latest cancellation when they didn’t give me anything despite Flying club, mega miles and the rest – no way.)
  We were literally just about to book up for this winter only to see this news a few days ago.
  Unfortunately we (a) have two reward flights to use and (b) love Barbados so really have no option but to use VA. Can’t abide going through London under any circumstances so it’ll be Manchester again. However checking reveals even the Manchester flights may be problematic.
  It’s not as if Barbados is unpopular, TUI manage to fill a plane or two from Scotland on a regular basis.
  All this bouncing about makes me wonder what they’re up to.
  Currently looking at Aer Lingus from Manchester for future use.

  • Erico1875 says:

    26 May26 May 17:57

    I don’t think they have promoted this adequately.

    • Erico1875 says:

      26 May26 May 18:04

      If Ryanair can fill a 737, 2 or 3 times a week to destinations such as Santiago, Zadar and Poitiers from Edi, surely, with a bit of effort Virgin could have succeeded with Barbados.

• pureshtuyot says:

  26 May26 May 12:29

  last week Virgin released a ton of redemption availability to South Africa JNB, in June. contrast with Zero Avios seats on BA.
  Are virgin struggling to put bums on seats?

  • Froggee says:

    26 May26 May 13:50

    I expect so. There was loads of redemption availability for Edinburgh to Barbados and they the axed it because of weak sales.

  • Rhys says:

    26 May26 May 14:27

    Virgin releases redemption seats on an adhoc basis rather than guaranteeing a fixed amount per flight like BA does.

    June is also the low season for flights to South Africa. Peak times are in the winter/over Christmas.

    • pureshtuyot says:

      26 May26 May 17:52

      Yet with BA there’s not a single reward seat to be had to JNB or CPT for May June, seems like they’re full despite low season

      • JDB says:

        26 May26 May 19:15

        Actually the BA Club availability to CPT has been surprising good. My wife just rebooked for us in April/May well inside the T-355 and there are still Club seats available for at least half the days in the second half of April and returns in early May. It may technically be the off season, but it’s still a great time to be there, including the protea season.

      • ChrisC says:

        26 May26 May 22:42

        Half of May and all of June aren’t even on sale yet so of course there are non available!

        What ever the time of year it’s a popular route and people are in there booking right on the moment when BA release seats at T-355

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